My 14 week old pup Cassie weighs a little over 16kg. As far as I have read this is excessive? I feed her puppy dry food and the occasional tin of puppy wet food. I take her for short, regular walks but I don't want to stress her growing joints too much. Vet said she may grow to 40kg. Should I be restricting her diet already or is she just a big girl?
Holy moly, she's a big girl! Pictures, please! What is her breeding? She shouldn't need much "formal" walking at this stage.
@Sonya what puppy food is she on right now? If Cassie is a large puppy from large parents, and by that I mean they are genetically tall and well built, I would most certainly be ensuring she is on a puppy kibble designed for large breed puppies at this stage. We have a bitch here who is naturally a big labrador, and this was evident from an early age. We took extra care over her diet, and also her exercise. We took the advice our vet and kept her on the slim side whilst she was growing, and actually, now she is heading towards 2 years old, we still keep her very slim.
She is on Pedigree pal puppy dry food at the moment. We have only had her a week and the breeders have been feeding her on veg, rice and meat home made mix and she was still with mum. https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?...-2207520000.1510740145.&type=3&size=1133,2015 Sorry, I have not quite worked out how to post photos but this facebook link will show you a picture of her.
Oh and as for her breeding her parents are pure. Mother has no papers and is golden and father has papers and is chocolate. I am in Australia so not sure what you mean by breeding. She is just a normal lab as far as I know!
As for her walks it is down to the workshop shed (50m) and down to collect the chicken eggs about 3 or 4 times a day (I run an egg laying business) and she rolls along with me trying to trip me up so it is exercise but not a walk as such. Chicken shed is about the same distance from the house as the workshop shed.
You need to set the photo to public on FB for us to be able to see it. I would get her off Pedigree (it's pretty poor food) and get her onto a large breed puppy food which will give her the correct balance of nutrients she needs. I meant are they field type, show type or a mix? Do they have big, blocky heads or are they finer featured? Are they tall? Basically trying to get an idea of what the parents look like - do you have pictures of them, too?
Ok I have changed the privacy setting and I think her parents would be more show type than field type. I don't have photos of them, sorry. I will change her food too.
It is always very difficult to tell from a photo. She is a gorgeous girl btw. To my eye her middle looks a bit too round, I know it is notoriously hard to judge in puppies though!
Yep, she is quite chubby! She loves her food but I don't feed her over much. Maybe because she was the last of a litter of 10 to go she was still getting plenty of milk from mum? Of the 10 pups the breeders said there were 8 normal size pups and two giant ones. She was one of the giants. Hopefully she is due a growth spurt that will take some of the puppy fat off her. Her feet are huge though.
Yep she was wormed, had her shots and weighed yesterday and that is what the vet said too. She is a bit overweight but hopefully a growth spurt will sort that. As well as being fat she is also a big girl in her frame. I will be interested to see how much she weighs when she thins off. I will not let her be obese all her life as I am sure that will lead to major problems for the poor girl lol! She had two of our leftover cooked veg and meat meatballs as a treat this morning with half a small bowl of pellets. I feed her regular small feeds rather than a couple of big ones.
Think it's really important not to have an overweight overactive pup when they are growing so fast. If you don't, you could end up with joint problems, especially with the European type Lab, which are more heavier boned.
My puppy Mila is just shy of 12 weeks old and when she was weighed at the vet's the other day, she came in at 13.8 pounds (6.25 kg). When we brought her home at nearly 8 weeks, she weighed between 9 and 10 pounds (4-4.5 kg). This means she's only gained about half a kg a week over the last month. I know they're all so different, but does this seem like a good growth rate? I had expected her to grow a bit faster in the first month, more like in the 1 kg per week range. Is this an indicator that she'll probably be a rather small girl?
